login sessions for django

Question

I'm trying to set login sessions within my web app but can not get it to work. I'm new to django and read the documentation for sessions but not making the connection to my web app. All I want from it at the moment is to check if a user is logged in and if not redirect to the login page.

Heres the code that i am trying to incorporate login sessions.

settings.py

INSTALLED_APPS = (
    'django.contrib.admin',
    'django.contrib.auth',
    'django.contrib.contenttypes',
    'django.contrib.sessions',
    'django.contrib.messages',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles',
    'logins',
    'dashboards'
)

MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES = (
    'django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.csrf.CsrfViewMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.messages.middleware.MessageMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.clickjacking.XFrameOptionsMiddleware',
)

urls.py

    from django.conf.urls import patterns, include, url
    from django.conf import settings
    from django.conf.urls.static import static
    from django.contrib import admin
    admin.autodiscover()

    urlpatterns = patterns('',
        url(r'^$', 'logins.views.login', name='login'),
        url(r'^accounts/auth/$', 'logins.views.auth_view', name='auth_view'),
        url(r'^accounts/dashboard/$', 'dashboards.views.dashboard', name='dashboard'),
        url(r'^accounts/logout/$', 'logins.views.logout', name='logout'),
        url(r'^accounts/invalid/$', 'logins.views.invalid', name='invalid'),

views.py for logins

    from django.shortcuts import render, render_to_response, RequestContext
    from django.http import HttpResponseRedirect, HttpResponse
    from django.contrib import auth
    from django.core.context_processors import csrf

    def login(request):
        c = {}
        c.update(csrf(request))
        return render_to_response('login.html', c)

    def auth_view(request):
        username = request.POST.get('username', '')
        password = request.POST.get('password', '')
        user = auth.authenticate(username=username, password=password)

        if user is not None and user.is_active:
            auth.login(request, user)
            return HttpResponseRedirect('/accounts/dashboard')
        else:
            return HttpResponseRedirect('/accounts/invalid')

    def logout(request):
        auth.logout(request)
        return render_to_response('logout.html')

    def invalid(request):
        return render_to_response('invalid.html')

views.py for dashboard app thats being logged into

from django.shortcuts import render, render_to_response, RequestContext
from django.http import HttpResponseRedirect, HttpResponse
from django.contrib import auth
from django.core.context_processors import csrf

def dashboard(request):
    return render_to_response('dashboard.html')

Answer 1

Its very simple to do that in django: In this example the sessions will be saved in the db (you have to sync your django app with your database)

User-Login:

from django.contrib.auth.models import User
from django.contrib.auth import authenticate, login
if request.method == 'POST':
    username = request.POST.get('nickname','')
    password = request.POST.get('password','')
    user = authenticate(username=username, password=password)
        if user is not None:
            if user.is_active:
                request.session.set_expiry(86400) #sets the exp. value of the session 
                login(request, user) #the user is now logged in

And for the other sites (where you need to be loggedin):

def my_func(request):
    if request.user.is_authenticated():
        print (user.id) #the user is loggedin

Or you use the login_require-decorator:

from django.contrib.auth.decorators import login_required

@login_required
def my_func(request):
    print(user.id) #the user is loggedin

Answer 2

You can use Django's built-in authentication system which takes care of checking whether a user is logged in or not. You can use login_required decorator.

views.py

from django.contrib.auth.decorators import login_required

@login_required
def my_view_login_required(request):
    return render_to_response('dashboard.html')